SCORPIONS‘ “Comeblack”, a new album of classic rock covers and fresh performances of signature repertoire recorded last year, sold around 5,000 copies in the United States in its first week of release to debut at position No. 90 on The Billboard 200 chart.

SCORPIONS‘ last collection of all-original material, “Sting In The Tail”, opened with 18,500 units to land at No. 23. This marked the band’s highest chart debut in over 20 years. The CD also landed at No. 6 on the Rock Albums chart.

“Sting In The Tail” was released in North America on March 23, 2010 via Universal Music Enterprises. The CD was recorded at a studio in Hannover, Germany with Swedish producers Mikael “Nord” Andersson and Martin Hansen (the team behind THE RASMUS‘ “Dead Letters” CD).

Launched by guitarist Rudolf Schenker in 1965, SCORPIONS forged metal, rock and pop into a sound that’s come to signify an entire genre through hard rock anthems like “Rock You Like A Hurricane” and hits like “Send Me An Angel”, “Wind of Change” and “Still Loving You”, selling more than 100 million records in the process.

In January 2010, SCORPIONS announced that the group’s “Get Your Sting And Blackout” tour, an epic ongoing worldwide rock ‘n’ roll odyssey in support of 2010’s “Sting In The Tail”, would be the group’s last before retirement. The tour is slated to run through early 2013 with a string of historic farewell blowouts and festival performances scheduled Europe culminating with shows at the Wacken Open Air festival (August 4, 2012) and Munich’s Olympiahalle (October 13, 2012).

At some point during the “Get Your Sting And Blackout” tour (“We can’t remember the day, the month or the hour”), SCORPIONS, enjoying the success of “Sting In The Tail” and the emotional rejuvenation of the farewell tour (“Screaming fans everywhere we went!”) decided to record one last classic album. “The idea to go back to the studio was born out of pure excitement,” said the band who cut an album mixing covers of rock ‘n’ roll standards that informed and inspired the SCORPIONS alongside new productions and performances of the songs in the band’s core catalog that have proved the most meaningful to the members.

The result, “Comeblack”, is, according to the band, “an encore for our die-hard fans, to thank them for all the support for so many years. At the same time, this is a tribute to legendary bands from the sixties, like THE BEATLES and THE ROLLING STONES, who have inspired us to follow our dreams. We hope you like it as much as we do… Rock on and … Comeblack.”